Well, obviously you can eat lutfisk without bechamel sauce! There are many ways to enjoy most every type of food. And if you crave it (like I do) it is possible to make bechamel with gluten-free flour (yeah, yeah, whatever - It's a very few times every year - paleo-schmaleo). And green peas are among the least disagreeable legumes (I consider them fully OK). As for the odd potato...

Due to the fasting periods of the western Church, fish (salted, dried or farmed) was a most important trading commodity in days of yore. Salted herring and several varieties of dried fish were exported from Scandinavia to all over western Europe, and in Portugal and Spain bacalhao (pardon my lousy Iberian spelling) is still very popular (as is salted cod in the Caribbean). Lye-fish is not only eaten in the Nordic countries, but still in some parts of Germany, where it is eaten especially on Ash-Wednesday (the beginning of Great Lent). In Scandinavia some people also eat lutfisk on Midsummer's eve (another dead give-away for a fasting food!). So lutfisk is not really a Christmas-food but a dish for the 4-week pre-Christmas Advent-fast, and for all the other fasting periods of the year as well. Thus the combination of bacon and lutfisk, while delicious, is not in accordance with the fasting rules of the Church. But it does occur in Sweden as well. For those of you interested in the
 fish that shaped the modern world (literally!) read Mark Kurlansky's excellent book simply entitled "Cod".

By the by, I would consider the Norwegian national-dish to be "får i kål" ("sheep in cabbage").
Erik F.


"Mensch, werde wesentlich! Denn wenn die Welt vergeht,
so fällt der Zufall weg; das Wesen, das besteht.
Viel haben macht nicht reich. Der ist ein reicher Mann,
der alles was er hat, ohn' Leid verlieren kann.
Freund, so du etwas bist, so bleib doch ja nicht stehn:
Man muß aus einem Lichte fort ins and're gehn."
        Angelus Silesius